


Old Man Winter

by GretchenSinister



Category: Rise of the Guardians (2012)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-17
Updated: 2019-02-17
Packaged: 2019-10-30 01:07:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 619
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17818904
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GretchenSinister/pseuds/GretchenSinister
Summary: Original Prompt: "Sorry about the long prompt, didn’t know how to get what I wanted to say across and make it shorter. ^_^“Jack was alone for 300 YEARS. For that time he was completely alone, with absolutely no one to interact with him. I see all these fics where the only thing wrong with him is that he’s touch starved, or lonely, or doesn’t know how to handle being with the Guardians. Well, I would think being alone that long would lead to insanity. So what if in all that time Jack developed some kind of mental disorder? Maybe he has voices in his head that he talks to and they are the source of his most mischievous (and dangerous) pranks (The blizzard of Easter of ‘68 was a prank that not only ruined Easter but maybe got innocent people hurt/killed?) Maybe he developed a split personality that he interacts with outwardly (such as in the case of Gollum from Lord of the Rings) and flips back & forth between them unexpectedly? What ever disorders you anons out there can think up, feel free to use them...[cut for length]"Jack’s found some new powers and some old gaps in his memory. It’s probably going to become a problem that Old Man Winter and Jack Frost are both believed in, now.





	Old Man Winter

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on Tumblr 4/7/2014.

Praise of Jack’s teeth hadn’t been the only things Tooth’s fairies had told her about him over the years, but after talking with Jack and spending time with him during their struggle with Pitch, she can’t help but wonder if maybe her fairies had been mistaken in this. Jack, as far as she can see, is only Jack, and no other. The other Guardians haven’t mentioned anything strange to her either, and she’s almost certain they would. After all, they talk about Jack quite a lot now.  
  
So maybe her fairies were wrong. Jack is singular, and only the fairies’ initial existence as fragments of a whole made them think that he was a completely different person sometimes when they saw him. There was, there is, no Old Man Winter. Jack’s moods just changed, like everyone’s.  
  
Toothiana catches up to Jack one night in October, his first as a Guardian. In this mellow, yet surely waning time of year, with more frosts called for every night, she’s surprised to find him perched, perfectly still, on an already-barren tree branch, looking silently out at the dense neighborhood below.  
  
“Jack?” she calls, and he turns towards the sound of her voice. As he does, she sees the faintest of glimmers, like sunlight hitting a single snowflake, rising from his head. It reminds her of the thin strand of dreamsand that always connects Sandy to the dreamers of the world, no matter what else he might be doing. It’s strange to see something like that coming from Jack, who is, after all, so young.  
  
“Tooth! Hi!” He waves at her, but otherwise doesn’t move, and she flies up to land beside him. “It’s good to see you.”  
  
“I didn’t know when I’d run into you next, since you must be getting busier than ever, now,” she says. “Anything new?”  
  
“Actually, yeah.” Jack laughs. “You’d think I’d be used to fall now, to the start of winter. But actually my memories aren’t that great for this time of year. I remember the ends of winters more clearly. But this year, I’m remembering almost everything.” He taps his staff on the branch. “In fact, I think I might even be remembering things I’m pretty sure I never learned.”  
  
Tooth glances at the space above his head.  
  
Jack nods. “Like that strand of ice. Didn’t know I could do that. But now…I think I could bring all of winter just from here. Which is, you know, extra weird, because I didn’t think that was actually entirely my job. Though I guess I am more powerful now.” He shrugs, and looks over at Tooth. “Do you think my memory will improve?”  
  
“I don’t know, Jack.” Has the frost always spread away from his feet like that? “Even human memory is tricky. But I’d like to know if yours does. If anything seems…strange.”  
  
Jack nods. He looks up to the stars, and just for an instant he shimmers clear as ice. “Tooth, do you think I could have ever been believed in as someone other than Jack Frost?”  
  
“Maybe,” she says softly.  
  
“What would happen to that spirit now?”  
  
Tooth sees his sweatshirt blur into a cloak, his shoulders broaden, his hair whips out like a mane behind him. One blink, and the vision is gone. “I don’t know,” she admits. “They might still have to exist somehow.”  
  
Jack grins. “Think of the fit Bunny would pitch if there were two of me.”  
  
Tooth laughs, and wonders if Jack can tell it’s forced.  
  
 _Not two of you. You and Old Man Winter._  
  
When she leaves, she’s not sure if she should use a wish to stop that from happening, or to make sure it does.

**Author's Note:**

> Comments from Tumblr:
> 
> tejoxys said: Ooh, this one’s eerie!


End file.
